30 May 2015

I made the cake this chocolate cake with only with cocoa powder but without chocolate itself. It's the easy way to make chocolate but it has definite flavor of cacao. I also sprinkle some rum in the end to enrich the flavor.

29 May 2015

Soba is low in calories and great for dieting but it can be too light to have as itself. That's why Soba noodles are usually served with Tempura. Deep fried aubergine is fating but goes so good with Soba.

28 May 2015

I made dried tomatoes in oven the other day. You need to set 90c to 100c in the oven to dry the tomatoes for about one to two hours. I know the method but I hardly make it because it takes time in the oven. Yet they're very useful for anything.

27 May 2015

This is a fish section of local super market I love. Actual size of the fish section is three times of this photo. There are many fish I still haven't tried. The name of the fish and the price is written in the board so it's very easy to shop here. The shop is clean and they keep the fish in good condition.

25 May 2015

This is the second dish I made with a whole tuna of the other day. We had it in Japanese way for the first day then enjoyed in French way for the second half. I made basil sauce along with usual vinaigrette sauce.

24 May 2015

I bought two different beef in same section of Rib eye, one is "Australian grass fed" and "Grain fed Angus" to try to find the taste differences in two. I didn't ask about where the Angus beef is from but I think it's Australian.

As a matter of fact, there was a big difference in price so it was not exactly a good examples of comparison. The one above is "Grass fed" S$10 and the bottom is "Angus" S$17.

Angus beef was obviously taster than Grass fed. As you can see in uncooked photo, the meat is much silkier and shinny with less amount of fat. For the after cooking, it looked similar and they were both tender meat.

The taste of Grass fed is light and has slight favor of something I don't know exactly how to describe; hint of flavor of liver. Grain fed tastes as good taste of beef.

23 May 2015

This is a Tuna fish I prepared in last posting. Tataki's original meaning is to lightly grill in fire made with straws. It also means to cook lightly just outside and keep rare inside. I cooked with sesame oil in flying pan this time. The sauce is Ponzu sauce; mix of soya sauce with citrus and daikon radish.

Miso soup is something Japanese people have everyday with rice. Of course it depends on family but some people have them every meal, in the morning and evening. My family usually have them in the morning.

There is rough rule for ingredients of the soup; that you need to put two to three ingredients that match well together. There are varieties of miso throughout Japan depending on the region. I love the Miso from Shinshu; around Nagano.

20 May 2015

I made this with beef stew left of the other day. Courgette is soft enough to scoop out the inside with spoon, but it's even better if you have a melon baller. It needs to be cooked in the oven until courgette becomes tender.

We hosted a casual brunch on Sunday. I made Brioche for the first time and I made them with small amount of butter so they very light. Making of brioche was not as difficult as I thought even though I don't have dough developer, it's warm enough in Singapore to leave in room temperature.

The sauce of gnocchi is made with chicken stock I made with chicken. It went well with gnocchi very well. Beef was grass fed tenderloin and it was very good taste.

The dessert was bit of failure... I didn't put eggs enough that the dough was heavy to raise. Plus it's not a good dessert to make in humid country because the crusts lose crispiness very fast. Yet I have to make it better than this..

This is Shiokoji marinated Yellow fish. In Japanse cuisine, marinated fish is one of the popular way to eat fish. In this way we can keep the fish longer. We use certain pastes for marination, such as Miso or Sake kasu then grill in the fish oven.

Shiokoji is also a great paste to marinate fish. I though of marinating Yellow fish because the texture of the fish becomes better with marination. I marinated fish for one day then cooked in non stick frying pan. It was a perfect.

14 May 2015

This is something similar to Mapo doufu but I made it much milder way with Japanese miso paste. I also added minced onion and carrots for the sauce. It's good to boil tofu in salt water before adding meat sauce.

13 May 2015

Even though I usually buy chicken as a whole, a whole chicken takes time to cook in oven as itself. So I break down into pieces and place them in casserole to roast in the oven. It takes much less time to cook this way. I also put some red onions and lemon zest this time. Lemon makes a great fresh flavor.

12 May 2015

Pissaladiere is olive and onion pizza from south of France. It's usually cut in small size nad served as aperitif. It looks like pizza but the dough is not exactly like pizza but more like bread. I made this as a main dish of lunch so I added small amount of tomato sauce.

11 May 2015

This is one of the famous Taiwanese dish. Braised minced pork with rice. I made this with the soya sauce cooked pork belly of the other day. I like to make this with the pork with skin because it adds gelatinous texture. This is really delicious with white rice.

10 May 2015

Shrimp deep fry is one of the popular Japanese western dish. We usually serve this with tartar sauce. Since there are many kind of shrimps available in Singapore, I made these with large black tiger shrimp.

09 May 2015

This is Singaporean local noodle. There is similar dish in Hong Kong local fried noodles called "Beef hor fun". I think they're same dish but it tastes different because the local soya sauce are different. This flat rice noodle is usually dried in Hong Kong but they were boiled and packaged in Singapore. To be honest, I prefer Hong Kong style.

07 May 2015

This is a dish that I referred the recipe from Japanese TV cooking program. Sauce is made with fish stock, minced bacon, minced celery and creme. Because white snapper is a quite plain fish, I thought that bacon creme sauce would match well.

06 May 2015

This is long hour stewed pork belly in soya sauce and Taiwanese spice. I happened to buy few packages of pork belly the other day because they were discounted. It's better to drench pork belly first then cook them without soya sauce before it becomes tender.